Shatter
by Arya May
Summary: He wonders sometimes what it would be like to grow wings and fly, but then there's always been something there keeping him from throwing it all behind him. - Voryn Dagoth/Indoril Nerevar. On hiatus until probably forever.


_**Shatter**_

**A/N: Just some notes before we begin, because I'm pretty sure not everyone's as much of a a lore geek like I am XD.  
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*********EDIT: Gods, I'm _so_ sorry... I can't believe I messed up the vocabulary. I'm so sorry. **

**1) Before Morrowind was named Morrowind (ie. in Nerevar's day) it was called _Resdayn_.**

**2) I'm pretty sure you all know this, but this entire story takes place before the rise of the ALMSIVI Tribunal and Azura's curse upon the Chimer. Therefore, that's why I don't refer to them as Dunmer, because they're _aren't_ that yet.**

**3) I'm going to use my artistic license and say that Sotha Sil was a member of House Telvanni and Almalexia was a member of House Dres. Besides that though, hardly any of Nerevar's, Voryn's, or the ALMSIVI's pasts are covered in the in game canon. This means a lot will be my own creation, but it _will_ follow the chronological timeline of events. For the canon-whores out there, I really_ can't_ stick to canon if there simply is _no_ canon.  
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**4) For those who actually read the _36 Lessons of Vivec_: I'm sorry, but I'm not even going to try to include it in here. It's just too complicated, and I hardly think a lot of people here understand CHIM. Plus, most (_all_) of it I bet is total Temple propaganda, ie. why the hell is Nerevar a caravan guard = =;;;;?  
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**5) Last and not least, I don't have to remind people that this is a _slash _****story. That means m/m, people- so if you don't like it, then don't read it.****  
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_(**Disclaimer**: I wish I owned The Elder Scrolls.)**  
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_**i.**_

They are but mortal beings, rooted to the earth of Mundus- but even then, Nerevar had always dreamed of the infinite vastness of the overlaying sky. It was a hunger that gripped him early on like the claws of a predatory hunter, whispering of the vertigo that accompanied the climb and the fall, flight and descent- laws that he knew not even the gods themselves could defy. There, his heart would unfold; transcend into webs of the surreal realities. The sense of freedom that consumed him was similar to that of waves of never ending flames.

There were no shadows in the skies, nor cries of past horrors as his breaths open and unfurl. There was only the faint light that fell to the translucent dawns, streaming down from Aetherius.

**...**

_**ii.**_

He never expected that being the youngest leader of House Indoril in recorded history would be an easy affair, consisting of nothing but peace and stability, loyal advisors and unwavering friends. He was young, a bit too rash sometimes for his own good, but certainly not naïve, nor easily swayed. He knew what to expect, who to put his confidence in, the ones he should keep an eye on- even without the occasional word that his agents slipped to him about the different factions within murderous Resdayn politics. Already he had started wondering if any of his would-be food would be poisoned, how many of the words spoken to him were foul lies.

_They'll be all trying to control you for their own ends_, Voryn had warned him- _tread carefully._

The natural kindness and amiability that was his common disposition made it easy for him to trust someone- a little too easy, he sometimes noted with a small feeling of suspicion as he looked back at the invisible pieces of the game he was so precariously dangling above the abyss. Despite everything though, growing up under his family's prestige had been its own kind of innocence, the kind that came with something that wasn't quite indulgence but a sense of protectiveness that had been shrouded around him since birth. He never truly did grow out of it.

The first time someone tried to murder him was clumsy- and the clumsiness was why he survived thereafter with only a faint scar on the small of his back to tell of the tale. It turned out that the assassin committed suicide to evade capture, but that fact that he got away with it in that way wasn't enough for Voryn, who bluntly told him in that angry but yet so ironically calm and distant way of his that he wasn't invincible.

They never found out who it was that was responsible for the incident, but that deeply irrational part of Nerevar's mind- the part that would end up getting him killed prematurely if he decided to follow the cajoling of- found it almost flattering that his best friend or mentor or _something_ cared so much about his wellbeing.

(And it was probably the same culprit that caused his skin to flush oddly when he dwelled on the subject sometime later, though he ended up blaming it on the heat.)

**...**

_**iii.**_

He met Voryn years and years ago (condensed for their people- he's been told that for them, one year is the equivalent of _many_ for the short lived races of men) when he was still a child enough to believe in that horrible something that lurked under the bed. It's a sentimental trifle that still makes him smile when he glances back on it, because it was memorable, and he knew that that was one of those key moments in one's life when they knew that it was changed for the better.

He remembers the warm suns of Resdayn's ashy deserts on his face as he watched a pair of desert falcons attack each other in a show of territorial dominance, as well as a rare shallow stream in front of him as he moodily threw Bittergreen Petals into the lazy waters. He was never too satisfied with himself back then- the forgotten child, or else- always living under his father's dictatorial shadow. He didn't look the part of what a Chimer would expect for a clan leader either- taking after his mother, where the grim, jagged look that became the trademark for many of their people traded itself for a more vulnerable appearance.

Maybe that was why Voryn didn't recognise him at all really- even if he was of a different clan- when he had informed Nerevar dispassionately that the stream was his meditational spot. Perhaps that was what led to their argument turned conversation turned later _fascination_ with each one another, when they met eye to eye again in maturity as not little kid and apathetic passerby but as the future heirs of their respective Houses.

He doesn't know whether or not if the other remembers the obscure first meeting they had at the riverside, but the whole affair's a stupid and utterly charming thing that he's never really forgotten.

**...**

_**iv.**_

It was hard to uphold his title as House Indoril's leader at first, when his father died unexpectedly and he was thrust with the responsibility of keeping everything together on his shoulders. No one really really expected much from him at first; he knew that they thought him to be easily controlled- that it would be child's play to pull him like a malleable puppet, dangling on strings. He thinks that he surprised the multitude of his people when he ended up proving that he was more than a capable leader-a combination of thoughtfulness and confidence, his conscience not marred by the characteristic streaks of cruelty that previous lords had been known for.

The change is so sudden that many don't know what to make of the new heir; this _child _that had taken over the Indoril seat of power. At the funeral service, when the pyre that had held his father's body was burning- scattering ashes to the planes of Oblivion, Nerevar had accepted the consolidations of the other dignitaries with a melancholic smile spoke more of an uncertainty at what was to come as opposed to sorrow.

(It was after all, not fitting for someone of his station to show grief at an inevitability, he knew his predecessors would say. They were a hard, jaded people- toughened from the eras of self-imposed exile. Weakness was not an open option.)

**...**

_**v.**_

He learns to read the other as time goes by, and it's almost like learning a new language. Azura knew that Voryn was hardly the emotionally sensitive type, normally impassive to the point where people would take the gesture as one of intended rudeness- though that was ever hardly the intention. They don't bother to discern the faint changes in his expressions, the restless shifting of his hands, the set of his jaw, the lines on his brow. And though it seemed like a joke to the more cynical, Nerevar knew that under the frigid exterior, Voryn was more loyal and trustworthy than any of his other friends had to boast of.

The second time he nearly died was quite a while after the assassination attempt, though this time the motive was far less intended malice on his person and more like just an ambush that caught his traveling party by surprise. Humans. _Nords_, Nerevar thinks they call themselves- the Atmorian invaders who desired to expand into Resdayn and had already taken Skyrim and much of High Rock. It is a pitch black night and the best source of lighting they have are a few torches, but years of harsh living conditions and experience with his swords is enough to feel the sensation of blade cutting into flesh, and hear the howls of pain that follow after. It was pure luck that a stray arrow managed to hit him as the bandits are chased off, a straggling shot, aimed at nothing in particular but probably empty space, and by an ill curse of fortune punctured his lung.

_You're not invincible, _he vaguely remembers Voryn saying as he collapsed into what felt like a puddle of wet blood. It was almost funny in a hysterically twisted way, and he wondered if he was going to die as he wheezed for breath there on the ground, prayers uttered silently within his mind to Moonshadow as he faintly heard screams for help before he blacked out.

Nerevar wakes up on a surface much too soft to be the sleeping roll he remembers using for travelling, and before hearing a priestess exclaiming praises to Boethiah, saw a familiar pair of amber eyes meet his own delirious ones in what almost looked like worry. His mind was an unfamiliar blur, and he half remembers stammering out something incoherent as he reaches for hands that he swore he held in some other life.

"Voryn…?" he remembers asking, struggling to see in the darkness, "Is that you?"

He knows that the older mer would probably want to remain silent, or maybe tell him to go back to sleep because he had never been comfortable with conversation as lost as this. It makes him laugh painfully, but the gesture ends up causing him cough in such a broken manner that he almost misses the way Voryn draws in a sharp breath of concern.

"You shouldn't talk." A pause, as though the other Chimer was trying to find the correct words, "I do not wish for… for you to reopen your wounds."

He hears the strained notes of guilt under the emotionless cover. _I'm sorry. This shouldn't have happened._

"Am I going to die, Voryn?" he asks, illogically marveling in his wound induced stupor at the way the moonlight makes his companion's long raven hair give off an almost unearthly sheen, "If I do, I-"

"That's enough. Do not be so morbid."

Hearing this, he smiles- flutters shut his dilated eyes for a few moments in thought.

(Because if he really _was_ going to die, if he had lost favor with Azura and her comrades and the mechanisms of Fate, a fatalistic thing that he had always seemed to have believed in, then at least he would have died with his closest confidante next to him.)

Maybe it was the delirium was pushing his common sense aside, but in that moment of haziness, he finds that he has very little control over his conscious actions. He stares at the other almost in a manner that imitates confused captivation, before brushing his fingers on the other's wrist and murmuring: "This is strange, isn't it…? I apologize. It just seems odd for you to let someone so close to you-"

"_Nerevar_."

(Voryn says it like a strained warning, he knew that, but at the same time he didn't- and didn't even know what he was doing.)

"I-"

"You don't know what you're saying. Just… please. Get some rest. We'll talk next morning."

He doesn't recall much of what happened after that when he left the healing wards, other than the fact that there was something akin to a hole in where his stomach used to be when he recalls what he does recall. There is a silent agreement between them both not to talk of the incident, treat it as though it never happened, with him too bashful and Voryn too embarrassed at that sudden shift in attitude caused by the injury that awkward night. But everything seemingly goes back to normal on the surface of things.

**...**

_**vi.**_

The incident with the Nord aggressors has the entirety of not only House Indoril, but the other Chimeri clans too in an uproar for war and vengeance. Nerevar was farsighted enough to see that if they went to war against such a coordinated force when they themselves were ready to slit each other's throats at a second's notice, they would be walking into a suicidal pit.

So at the emergency council that is called between the leaders of the different Houses, he lays it down flat that the greater good against the foreign invasion was more important than squabbles amongst their own peoples. It feels intimidating at first to speak so boldly in front of such an audience of peers, but there is something pushing him- had been pushing him since the fact that he had cheated Padomay's darkness twice in succession. It was that something that made his words flow like liquid water- clarion and persuasive enough to earn the respect of even the most arrogant Telvanni mages. He was quite certain that Azura only enabled him to speak in such a way once, because never again did he recall the lines coming to him in so naturally a manner as they did.

(He is elected Hortator, a title that none had held since the days when his people had followed Veloth into Vvardenfell. It surprises him, although he knows that there were dissidents whispering of his inexperience, thinking him weak- easy to overthrow.)

The political tide's sudden turn shakes their world to its knees, the age old tensions and feuds now suddenly smoothed over under a form of unity that hadn't been present since a millennium past. Voryn tells him that he needs to make his position as the General something permanent, sooth down the jutting thorns that dig into the fragile truce amongst the Great Houses. He needs to make a statement that formally declared unity, something that was novel enough to seal it.

The First Council is created, an effort to make that public display. It is there that he meets Vivec, who has the cunning of a fox and a tongue embedded in silver and Sotha Sil, whose cautious wisdom and counsel Nerevar appreciates amidst the clamor for fighting and bloodshed. Voryn's presence is now more important than ever, because House Dagoth's support was one of the most important ones to secure of all, and-

Nerevar doesn't like politics. Hates it actually; scorns it. It is a minefield of lies and carefully woven deceptions. He hates dishonesty more than anything, next to cruelty and empty slaughter. He doesn't relish the idea of the kill unlike so many of his people, though he could never say it out loud in a society where mercy was deemed as cowardice.

Voryn know this, he thinks. The old unanswered questions between them are ignored for now, though in truth they are as blatant as ever between them. For now, they rest untouched.

**...**

_**vii.**_

(He wonders sometimes what it would be like to grow wings and fly, but then there's always been something there keeping him from throwing it all behind him.)

**...**

_**viii.**_

"…powerful family within Dres." Vivec states with a flourish that Sotha Sil, in all his Telvanni haughtiness, raises an eyebrow to, "You need to secure her family's goodwill if this scheme of yours to unify all of our… unfriendly competition... is to be successful. They are dangerous if they turn against you, mark my words, Lord Indoril."

It's not like as if he hadn't been expecting it- they all had, he thinks, but then again, the rotten apple is often forgotten when there had been a successful harvest. Things had been going so well, up to the point where Nerevar thinks that he has enough support to introduce the second part of his plan to repel the Nordic enemies. He had done too much to fail now.

So when he waves almost absentmindedly for his councillor to continue with his report, it's almost with a sense of rare irritation that touches his normally calm interior. He knows that there was- _is_- opposition to his reforms, because there would always be that faction which opposes him, with claims that the old ways should be preserved like the sacred anecdotes they are. Otherwise, they were blinded by their distaste of each other; the natural tension that always arose between the Great Houses. And then there was the expected envy that he would be a target of, since he now held the highest office that Resdayn had to offer.

He could go on with what being Hortator had taught him in the last few moons, which had both dragged on like sluggish mud and passed as fast as the rising desert winds. Azura knows, he had started feeling a wariness creep into him that he had not felt present before.

"Surely you are aware that your election as our General was not universally accepted. There are always the troubles that arise later, troubles that we might as well deal with now. Petty families mainly, but not the Damyri branch of House Dres."

"And just what has been happening that makes you fear their allegiance?"

There is a pause before Vivec sighs and folds his hands together on the desk. Voryn wears a slight frown on his face at the unfortunate development to events, but as composed as ever, says nothing.

"You know how the Dres are like- conservative; predictable; traditional in every sense of the word. Damyri sees the fact that Lord Indoril is Hortator is preposterous. Essentially, they believe it to be a violation to our ancestors' sacred laws, and that the simple word of the Good Daedra will be good enough to sweep the _n'wah_ invaders back to their territories. So far they have been keeping low with their dissatisfaction, but I fear that might not always be the case."

He doesn't say it out loud, but Nerevar knows what his advisor is implying. _One false move, and they will turn against you, wreck this plan which you tried so hard to follow. _A touch of uncertainty flickers over his eyes.

"Surely they can be bought." Sotha Sil says with a faint shrug and the look of one who was familiar with such matters.

"I fear not. Not everyone shares the Telvanni view on the world."

"Then pray tell Vivec, do you have a _better_ idea?"

Voryn interrupts the exchange with a wave of his hand, "Play on the family's honor." and Nerevar realizes that it is the best proposal that they have, though the implications are not without the tendrils of discomfort now worming themselves into his stomach.

He puts his hands down on the table's surface firmly, with an expression on his face that spoke of only the most impassive grim that he could muster. Around him, the others fall silent, and he keeps his voice to a non-concerned calm, a trick that he had mastered since the earliest days he had become leader of House Indoril.

"So we need to keep them under surveillance. I think that instead of any blatant action now, it might be good to keep things subtle."

"Then what do you propose, Hortator?"

"I think…" a pause, "I think that I need to demonstrate that I mean Damyri no ill will. If money will not lease their loyalties permanently, then perhaps like Vo_- Lord Dagoth_ said, their honor could be used as leverage instead. Offer one of them a place on the Council, let them think that they have er… some means to influence me. Besides, they wouldn't betray themselves."

**...**

_**ix.**_

The next time they hold a meeting, Nerevar sees a newcomer in the rooms. She calls herself Almalexia.

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